CAMPANTON, ISAAC B. JACOB:

By: Richard Gottheil, H. G. Enelow

Spanish rabbi; born 1360; died at Penafeel in 1463. He lived in the period darkened by the outrages of Ferran Martinez and Vicente Ferrer, when intellectual life and Talmudic erudition were on the decline among the Jews of Spain. The historiographers Immanuel Aboab ("Nomologia," ii. 2), Zacuto ("Yuḥasin," ed. Filipowski, p. 226b; compare "Seder ha-Dorot," pp. 27b, 28a), and Joseph b. Ẓaddiḳ (Neubauer, "Anecdota Oxoniensia," i. 99) unite in designating Campanton as a gaon, Aboab stating that he was styled "the gaon of Castile." Among his pupils may be mentioned Samuel (ibn Sadillo) al-Valensi and Isaac Aboab. He left but one work, "Darke ha-Gemara," or "Darke ha-Talmud" (A Methodology of the Talmud), which is an important contribution to the subject, as it attempts to be a practical guide for those who are called upon to teach the Talmud. It was published at Constantinople, sixteenth century; Venice, 1565; Mantua, 1593; and Amsterdam, 1706, 1711, 1754; and newly edited by Isaac H. Weiss, Vienna, 1891.

G. H. G. E.